The present invention relates to optical interconnects and more specifically to implementing optical interconnects between high speed electrical interconnects having a receiver detection circuit, such as, but not limited to, PCI-Express™.
The PCI Express standard (PCI Express™ Base Specification, Revision 1.0a, Apr. 15, 2003) includes a high speed path that is designed to work only with electrical interconnects. A PCI Express transmitter detects the presence of a receiver by measuring the time constant of the data output and determining if a 50Ω load on the receiver is connected.
In the case of an optical link, an optical transceiver may be electrically connected to the PCI Express device, however the optical fiber may not be connected. The PCI Express transmitter would detect the presence of a receiver, due to the presence of the optical transceiver, but if the optical fiber was not connected, no link would actually be present.